Participatory Video and Rural Community Construction in China

Modern China's rural society is undergoing great social changes accompanied by the fast development of Chinese economy, such as atomization and de-collectivization, the saturation of satellite TV further aggravating this process. Participatory Video (PV), as one of the participatory media, is playing a significant role in the reconstruction of China's rural society. This paper attempts to map out the current tendency of participatory video practices in China rural area through field research, and whose function on community construction and social changes. The author argues that the application of PV can exert great influences on community construction, including building community forum, strengthening community bond, and community education, which are beyond the capacity of main stream media. With the expanding of grassroots democracy and the self-administration of villagers, it could be expected that PV promotes the realization of the rights to speech, participate, decide and supervise at the level of individual and collective in the near future.